Finding Family treasure began with a phone call on a Wednesday afternoon. As all stories start, this one began with the history…

Uncle Jack was 62 years old when it became legal to own gold again in the US. The Gold Reserve Act of January 30, 1934 confiscated every citizen’s gold coin, bullion or Gold Certificates! FDR’s Executive Order 6102 made it a $10,000 fine and/or up 10 years in prison to hoard or keep your own gold. 1975 in our family was the “year of Uncle Jack”, he bought gold again legally. Forty two years the family listened while Uncle Jack bitched, whined and complained that if he had it to do over again, the government wouldn’t be able to take away what it couldn’t find! (It didn’t help Uncle Jack’s disposition that as soon as all the gold was confiscated that the value went from the $20 an ounce redemption price to $35 an ounce worldwide!) After all, gold coin and Gold Certificates were as common as federal notes are now. For 200 years Americans used gold and silver as currency, and then it was “illegal” to use and own, “strange”, Uncle Jack would chant, “that out of all the countries, only in the US was it illegal to possess gold…”

Uncle Jack never married, worked as a machinist in Connecticut until he retired, then moved back to his inherited farm in Virginia. He refused to call the “greenies” (federal reserve notes) cash. The caller on the other end other the phone continued, “I was only 18 when Uncle Jack arrived home from the “gold buying place” with a heavy canvas bag that didn’t seem to be very full. Uncle Jack announced proudly, “Today I started buying my gold back! There is $10,000 in gold coin there Johnny!” He opened the sack and I peered in and in all my wisdom announced, “I never thought $10,000 was so small!”

Well, I wasn’t there every time that Uncle Jack came back from the “gold buying place” but the family can document three arrivals to the farm of $10,000 in gold each time. Over the next 12 years I would stop in to Uncle Jack’s to find him slowly rocking on the front porch with the same greeting each time I arrived, “buy gold Johnny, it will be worth more than all the “greenies” you could ever hope to gather!”

Dad and I found Uncle Jack in his rocking chair. Silenced forever, never revealed the location of the buried gold coins, and only Dad and I knew that Uncle Jack had bought gold and buried it somewhere on the sixty acres. Dad bought a metal detector (most only reach a maximum of 15” in depth) and would comb the likely spots on the weekend. Dad’s been gone since 95 and now I am thinking of selling the property and I hate to think someone would find Uncle Jack’s fortune after I sell it. “DO you think Underground Discovery’s underground imaging equipment can find Uncle Jack’s gold coins?”

Fog was layered above the field to about the height of the orchard canopy. Our plan was to use two imaging machines to cover more area quicker. The property had been assessed and the logical places were first to be imaged, no luck. The day ended with no underground cache located. The following morning, the sun was shining warm and bright from the beginning. The grass in the orchard had been mowed, but the dew had already soaked our boots when we had the hit! As we crowded to see the computer screen, we could tell it was a ferrous (steel) object buried four feet deep. John was ecstatic, “Lets dig now!” We cautioned him that this may only be one stash with several left to find. As the shovels finally descended wide enough to bend over, to a depth of four feet , the shovel grated making the unmistakable sound of metal against the metal canister, an ammo box. Shaking the box like a Christmas package, John exclaimed, “I hear metal inside”. The box weighed about 15 pounds and contained 235 one ounce gold coins, about $10,000 worth at $42 an ounce in 1975. Today’s price, a cool quarter of a million! John announced on the spot that he wasn’t selling the farm.

Uncle Jack has to be smiling, knowing he outfoxed Uncle Sam but ultimately helped his namesake nephew save the family farm! Oh by the way John would like to have Underground Discovery back to find the other two hidden golden caches.

Note:
With the addition of our long range detector we would have located all the targets on this ranch the first day.

If you have a family treasure that has eluded the family’s discovery, call Underground Discovery before you sell the property, or when you finally want to see what buried treasure has been hidden all these years…